Why Harrison College is about to Change Hours of Operation

The following communication received in the blogmaster’s inbox is self explained. The traffic challenge in Bridgetown and its environs from sun up to sun down is well known. Please discuss for 10 marks.

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Nothing new here really.
One recalls that for the three weeks of the Australian cricket tour of Barbados in 1965, that school was called at 8:15 in stead of 9:15 to allow staff and students timeto go to watch the cricket.
Worked well.

I din go to HC so I don’t knw if my contribution is worth anything. But I don’t see a big deal. A bigger deal would be to ask the parents to drop the children half a mile away, and let them WALK (remember that word) the rest of the way.

What would have been useful is Duguid Bradshaw and the technocrats sharing with the public what is the comprehensive plan for traffic management in the city and Barbados. Drips and drabs approach is disrespectful to the Bajan public.

Instead of a representative formation a participatory system might be more helpful.

Barbados is only 21 by 14 miles. One only has to travel to a bigger country to recognize that such a island, Barbados, could have a transportation system where even the PM could go to work on either a bus, a tram, a boat or a bicycle.

Vincent
It is also noteworthy that there is congestion in the environs of QC.
From the early 70’s before the resiting of QC to St James. commuters from the north east bound for town turned at Redman’s village on to Prior Park Rd to freely access Bridgetown via Cave Hill drive or Grazettes or St Stephen’s Hill. The resiting of QC to St James has resulted in congestion of Prior Park Rd as well as Clermont Rd from the ABC highway.

The difficulty in getting into Bridgetown by drivers via all Highways was evident since the early 60’s. Clearly it has esccalated over the years, and the distance from Bridgetown where the grid lock begins has only increased.

Early commencent of the school day will solve nothing. It will only make morons believe that they are solving a problem.

Here is an idea for traffic congestion: One car per household, commercial deliveries between 6pm and 5am, and a congestion charge between 7am and 9am, and 3pm and 5pm. And a proper public transport system – and tell Simpson to bugger off. Problem solved.

I think a 7:30 start would be better but it is a step in the right direction.
If we had an excellent public transport system/ school bus system, senior students could start at 7:00 and the juniors at 8:00
Unfortunately, we are facing the reality of five decades of poor , ad hoc , planning. It’s time we refer to the loss five decades!
We are depleted of money and visionary leadership. Sometimes it just looks like putting patty on old boards.

Note that I am not saying that the resiting of QC is the main cause of congestion ion its environs; only that it has exacerbated the trend to do so. As more persons in the north acquired cars and were travellinhg along Highway 2A and seeking to cross over towards Bridgetown, this was bound to happen.
We tend not to think ahead, but only to look for ways to restrain horses long after they have bolted from the stable.

William re I think a 7:30 start would be better but it is a step in the right direction.
That will not help either.

As early as the 1963 coming from Rendezvous, there was congestion on Wildey to town, and at the Brittons Hill junction with Lower Forde’s Rd , along Culloden Rd on the Lower Collymore Rock, at the Beckles RTd Baystreet junction and on to town. It was so along Pine Rd and to the junction with St Barnabas and Highway 5.

You are 100% accurate when you opine “Unfortunately, we are facing the reality of five decades of poor , ad hoc , planning. It’s time we refer to the loss five decades!” Actially 6 decades is more acurate

“Barbados, could have a transportation system where even the PM could go to work on either a bus, a tram, a boat or a bicycle.”

Very true, but

The mindset of the nation needs top be taken into consideration. I used to work less than 5 miles from my home, but to get on a bicycle and go to work teaching at one of the big schools would have been looked down upon.

Our traffic problems are more complicated than cars and roads. It requires more than a shifting of work hours or a change of traffic patterns. Our notions of appearances and keeping up with the Joneses have be a part of our discussion

@ Hal
I have long opined that the school hours at primary school are too long.
@ Georgie Porgie
You are correct that the traffic build up was obvious since the mid sixties even in the dying days of the “board buses” the bus stand was already a mess.
What angers me more than anything else is the plaster on old sores policies that are being heralded as earth shattering.
These culprits( duopoly) literally refused to take an interest in the country and now pretending that all of these problems were unknown.
What are your views about a modern rainy system to radically eradicate our transportation problems?

re What are your views about a modern rail system to radically eradicate our transportation problems?
Interesting but………cost? where will we site it? Something to think about though.
But I will confess that my Eschatological leanings would suggest that it is too late. But then again we might employ it in the millenial reign.

Have you never seen a person with an old brek down taxi trying to get a brand new high end one rather than looking for a second hand one ?
The problem here is that we would put millions of dollars into a venture rather than realize that a slight adjustment could solve the problem.
I merely asked : what is the thinking about a modern rail system, that could perhaps slash cars on the road usage by forty percent; transport people quicker and thereby increase productivity and leisure time.
Go ahead and buy a thousand electric buses and still take two hours to get into Bridgetown while living twenty minutes in walking time from Bayville.
If we had a proper school bus system, at least thirty per cent of peak morning and afternoon commute would be less cumbersome.
Anybody will tell you that when school is on vacation, the commute time automatically reduces. And this is true for developed and under developed countries.
Vision is always laughed at until it is achieved. Go and read some autobiographies my friend. Peace.

@ Ping Ping
As a youngster , I was told that the gully known as Manning’s Quarry could be built on. The man who told me that, was one of my mentors, who only attended Bay Street school.
I saw his vision when the quarry became Paragon Tennis courts and buildings appeared.
You see my friend , I was fortunate to be exposed , from my teens, to people who had vision and who with limited education went on to achieve remarkable success in several areas of their existence.

It may be cheaper, healthier and more sustainable to close schools and build new schools sited in relation to the distribution of the population so that students can walk to school than building a rail system which will cost billions of dollars to build and operate. In any event I can assert that the school hours of Harrison College will not be changed, there will be no expansion of the school bus system and there will be nothing done to alleviate traffic congestion.

@ Hal
As the Transport Board fell victim to political skullduggery everything fell apart. My brother, the country was sold lock stock and barrel to the highest bidder. That’s why the mini bus culture is rampant. Politicians’ friends and family owned investments in the mini bus industry. You got permits when your party was in power etc. We have to ignore the crocodile tears that are being shed.
Note that there were many blacks who owned private bus companies. So all of this talk about privatization is smoke and mirrors because a sector of black entrepreneurship was slaughtered by the black political class.
Same thing happened in the tourism industry all the small black entrepreneurs were systematically marginalised
Same thing with black owned private high schools…………

On educationhttps://www.barbadosadvocate.com/news/new-martell-cognac-launched-barbados
“Massy Distributors has officially added one of the world’s most renowned cognacs to its slate of liquors being sold under its brand on the island. Martell’s line of cognacs, which are infamous for their well-blended and expertly marketed products around the world, had its big launch last Saturday on the majestic grounds of Nikki Beach Barbados located in Six Men’s, St. Peter.”

@William, are you not being too harsh along with some others… But first let’s touch on your comment that “I think a 7:30 start would be better but it is a step in the right direction….If we had an excellent public transport system/ school bus system, senior students could start at 7:00 and the juniors at 8:00”

Speaking just anecdotally I can’t see that senior school teenagers would be up and out daily to meet a 7 or 730 start…@Hal speaks to the experts views on that and maybe the reasoning are similiar to my concerns or maybe not, but based on past expert mouthing of the lazy, hazy sleeping habits of teenagers I am wary of your suggestion.

Consider that such a start would mean reveille at 5:30 latest for most…At least it would inculcate the cadet or scout camp discipline of early must-rise in many if that was tried…but I think not!!

Now to the main point… ok so planning has not been ideally great but certainly the ABC highway planning (which a nat hero supposedly debunked as ill conceived) and its related ability to help expand business beyond the puny Bridgetown corridor was sensible planning to alleviate just this issue of traffic congestion…..(What is special about Bridgetown anyhow as a business locale really…other than a heritage tourist location as some have long propsed …continue to move beyond the 3 -5 sq mile radius, period! )

I too don’t see how the change of school hours will alleviate the particular Bridgetown problem but at least somebody is thinking …even if misguided!

Bottom line the planners need to go way outside the box…rail is impractical (no viable land corridor) and costs could NEVER be economically feasible…how woukd those costs EVER be recovered!…. what of having senior student at the same HC (diligent n studious top boys and girls right) remote link to some classes on some days or for the same 7:30 (in their pajamas)… They come in after rush hour to do labs and other such stuff and then their extra curricula!

@Hal, so what of the noise of the commercial traffic lumbering through the streets in the dead of night, eh! Unless for exceptions I don’t see that as deeply needed…just ensure that commercial traffic does not clog up rush hour times…they can be out and at delivery sites before 730 AM, during the day or between 7- 9 PM !

These are issues handled by many jurisdictions and surely Bdos can continue to build on their sensible planning…and leave aside gimmicks and folly… not all their strategies were badly formed!

For example, if we look at most of the countries in the world, large and small, since world war two, we see few which have been able to do the mere minimal, like feeding themselves.

This does not happen by accident, it is a construct

The World Bank will never allow countries like Barbados to avoid a form of development which relies on the importation of food from the USA. And we just went there again for money.

The IMF, as always chaired by a European, operates in a similar way.

In this project to keep us underdeveloped and misquided, they can recruit generations of our own people to feed us with the dominant junk economics as supportive of high food import bills.

And if Barbados has not the national determination to do the basics, how is it ever going to be possible to chart the kind of future which minimizes the importation of systems and their problems, from elsewhere?

How can we ever begin to think away from having tens of thousands of cars lying idle for most of the time as creature comforts.

So govt once again reassured that benefits would be paid out in full measure to pensioners
Why wouldnt the govt speak the truth and tell these people they monies have been exchanged to pay govt debt
As for the NUPW they all need to be place on jet skis and pushed out to sea

@ Pacha
You buffle me! You are one of the harshest critics of our current socio economic state. Nobody on BU has requested the guillotine more often than you. Now you say we are too harsh on ourselves. We are too soft on ourselves in my opinion. Constantly looking to the new version of Massa to solve our problems only to end up passing test and conditions like eleven year olds!
In recent times you have agreed with going to the IMF.
We can’t get out of the international bankers and loan sharks claws by just analysing them. We need a quantum leap. Just abandon them and let the rupture past. The mind has to be cleared.
To quote Marvin Gaye: Whats going on ???

How are you going to know how many cars per house when most houses does not carry a number?
Ex: R. Lucus
Jackmans
St Michael.
Who is going to pick up the “congestion charges” and at what points???
Are you going to make me pay so much for a car, hit me with the gas tax, then charge me again to try to get my kids, the madam and myself to work on time?

Miss Motley is a politician and I don’t think she I looking to commit political suicide for her party.
I am sure she has heard the cry from the country about the taxes.

The problem could be simplified for alot less than we imagine if we only spent money to maintain the feeder roads. For example if I am heading North on Friday I avoid Warrens completely by going up Shop Hill and dropping down into Content. So simply widening and resurfacing the road from Waterford Round About and then putting in a spur road after the businesses places there by Dwellings straight cross the cane ground or bush ground, to come out above the school there below Bs recycling and Warrens problem done solve for who going north as you have just created a by pass. If you go up Shop Hill now and use that cart road that poses as a road to get to the left turn to Content, you would understand why nobody wants to use it and prefers to sit in the traffic of Warrens with their AC ON cussing about the traffic!

The same can be done to form a by pass for the city just be picking a route and cleaning up the flow. Maybe replace street lights with round abouts etc. So Black Rock all the way up to the round about before Bussa would then be a city bypass option. If you ask anyone why they don’t like that road the answer is always ” too many traffic lights.”

After all they collecting ” ringing” money with the new fuel tax, so spend some and help us frustrated motorist I beg you.

Why both teens and teachers could benefit from later school start times
Author Bio: James Williams is a Lecturer in Science Education, Sussex School of Education and Social Work at the University of Sussex

A typical school day in the UK starts around 8.30am. This is often even earlier elsewhere in the world, with students sitting down to their first lesson at 7.30am in the US.

But these early start times can play havoc with teenager’s natural sleeping patterns – with research showing that waking a teenager at seven in the morning for school is similar to waking an adult at four in the morning. And while many adults wouldn’t relish such an early alarm call every working day, it’s a “non-negotiable” expectation for teenagers.

The average teenager ideally needs eight to nine hours’ sleep each night, but in reality a lot of teenagers struggle to get this much – which can then impact their performance in the classroom.

A lot of the problems arise because our sleep patterns are not fixed, and they change as we grow. For teenagers, melatonin – the sleep hormone – doesn’t start being produced until 11pm. This is why teens don’t start feeling sleepy until late at night, and why simply telling a teenager to go to bed earlier doesn’t work.

So far Gaston Browne has achieved 2 of his main election 5 promises he made to Antiguans.

(1). To take over Barbados’ shareholdings in LIAT to become the airline’s majority shareholder.
(2). To build a UWI campus in Antigua, so Antiguans won’t have to travel to UWI Cave Hill.

His third promise………convincing the USA to relocate their embassy from Barbados to Antigua (so Antiguans would not have to travel to Barbados for visas……….. is perhaps proving a bit difficult to achieve at this time.

@Artax
9 out of 10 Antiguans complain about the costs of travelling to Barbados to secure US Visas of which they are frequently denied. They say they have to save for several months to reapply and even then there are no guarantee so Gaston as PM is looking after the needs of his constituents whether he will get the US to acceded to his demands is another story.

About the proposed University in Antigua, if the other Caribbean leaders allow him to browbeat them that will be an issue sure as night follows day other islands will want the same thing.

It is you who have to abandon the simple, even simplistic explanations and too rash of responses. In the search for deeper truths you are required to deploy more sophisticated methodologies.

”You ‘baffle’ me! You are one of the harshest critics of our current socio economic state. Nobody on BU has requested the guillotine more often than you. Now you say we are too harsh on ourselves.”’

Well we hold to everything here except for the last sentence. To us being too harsh on ourselves speaks to the absence of interrogation and location of the root cause which was required in the discourse. To us this position is consistent with the former statements. We see no internal contradictions.

Maybe you should give us some examples of similar states, regions, under the yoke of neoliberal-capitalism that have successfully challenged it while deploying straight-up economic confrontation or total abandonment as you suggest, in the absence of a plan to so do.

”Constantly looking to the new version of Massa to solve our problems only to end up passing test and conditions like eleven year olds!”

We certainly have no love for either the World Bank nor the IMF.

In the case of our support for this government’s approaches thereto, our continuing position has been that the country had/has no other options. That we would prefer to loose a leg that to have the whole body politic die. In other words, approaching a loan shark or international banksters than to have a country dying in silence like under the last regime. There were/are no good options.

In addition, you seem to have ignored the kernel our point which was an indictment of every economist we’ve ever seen in Barbados, including that one well-favoured by you.

Our point was that all the economists we’ve known have sold us ‘junk economics’. A brand of economics which makes us dependent on the importation of food, as basic! The deeper understanding would lead to the realization that the international financial system, on which everything relies, would cut us off in a heart beat should Mugabe decides that a radical land reform is the way to go. Should we not consider the deeper geopolitical conditions or would it be better to rely on simplistic and feel-good notions alone.

”’We can’t get out of the international bankers and loan sharks claws by just ‘analyzing’ them. We need a quantum leap. Just abandon them and let the rupture past. The mind has to be cleared.
To quote Marvin Gaye: ‘What’s’ going on ???””’

Nobody understands the need for a ‘quantum leap’ more than this writer. We have called for it millions of times. We would estimate that our critiques of the last administration were more biting, more profound, than yours.

But once we found ourselves in an economic pickle it would have been near impossible to again get out with your advice or develop ‘ourselves’ out of it based entirely on internal resources. Remember, we are talking about a country, not a personal financial matter. This is about more than clearing the collective mind. It is a ‘modern’ economy deeply dependent on foreign exchange. And all the mechanisms of foreign exchange are in the hands of empire.

You are right. People like Trotman, Coward, Birch, Tudor, et al all owned buses that worked. The early days of the Transport Board were also good. In he UK I had bragging rights about the Transport Board and voting at 18. Schools such as Modern High, Federal, Barbados Academy, etc. We had school buses, the fares were three cents and we got to school on time in the morning and walked home in the evening.
We are gong backwards, with the rise of the lawyer class. But, @William, have you noticed there is no direction, no vison, from any section of society. There is none from the politicians, the professional class, the academics, none.

@ Pacha
How can you a truly progressive thinker embrace our country going hand in glove to the same institutions you know and have declared decadent and exploitative of countries such as ours?
Please defend this volte face on your part.
Seems your desire to put them under the guillotine is tempered by their giving you a few million dollars with the understanding that your brothers and sisters must be sent home without the dignity of a paycheck.

Barbados has been, for decades, within the influence of the IMF and World Bank. Such membership is par for course in political-economy.

Do we agree with that state of affairs? No, but it is what it is.

All we have tried to do is to make the least worst choice. This admission is better countered by you suggesting a better and more practicable option.

Your second part obviously can’t be properly directed at us because you, yourself, could hardly believe that. Certainly, you must know that we are more inclined to take whatsoever we want without anybody’s permission, far less the IMF/WB

In addition, we have contended that the ‘few million dollar’, 290M USD, was way too inadequate in the first place. We certainly have no desire for anybody to be sent home. But again, you must tell us what were to be the other scenarios.

Is this your first call for the leading lights of the last regime to be subjected to a meeting with the guillotine?

I submitted my policies to BU and they were paying published. You will need to check the archives. The first order of business should have been a ban on importation of vehicles; civil servants should have been put on four day weeks; there was no need to abolish the NSRL; all non essential items; should have been banned for at least eighteen months; immediate reform of all and abandon plantations and placing them into immediate food crop production; fast forward the fishing industry; cooperative roads building programs etc.
All of the above will save foreign exchange and the rapid transformation of the economy will commence. Within a year at least a half billion dollars in forex would have been earned. Don’t forget a radical effort to collect the over billion dollars owed to government.
Hope you get the picture.

Civil servants being put on a four day week is a change in their work agreement and is also a pay cut. You would need an agreement from the unions/ each worker / a repeal of the law passed by the OA BLP.

@David June 29, 2019 8:26 AM “What would have been useful is Duguid Bradshaw and the technocrats sharing with the public what is the comprehensive plan for traffic management in the city and Barbados. ”

Comprehensive traffic management plan whu”

When most Bajans feel [not THINK] that having a car is a sign of having arrived .

Wasn’t it one of our most senior members of the political class who said that every Bajan should be able to have a little car at the door.

Well if every Bajan has a car at the door, that is exactly where it will remain…at the door, because they won’t be able to get it through the traffic. Lolll!!!

This is more than 20 years now that i haven’t had a car.

You can’t believe the number people who believe that I am low class because I catch the ZR vans.

Just his morning i was discussing with Little Johnnie, who did go to HC, that lack of sensible public policy about transportation has been one of Barbados’ most significant failures in the last 100 years.

This int a “B” thing, nor a “D” thing.

It is we is foolish Bajans thing.

Wasting nuff, nuff foreign exchange too.

Polluting the air.

Lack of exercise causing us to die at younger ages than our parents and grandparents.

Etc.

etc.

etc.

Mia and crew int going to be able to fix it neider, ‘becausin’ we is a bunch of poor gret poppets.

@de pedantic Dribbler June 29, 2019 “11:41 AM the experts views on that and maybe the reasoning are similiar to my concerns or maybe not, but based on past expert mouthing of the lazy, hazy sleeping habits of teenagers I am wary of your suggestion.”

My experience is that our brains wake up with the sun. Therefore the research conducted in northern climes about sleepy teenagers may not hold true for Barbados.

In late December the sun does not rise until after 8 in the morning, so of course the teenages are sleepy as night has barely passed.

Whereas in Barbados the sun rises by 6:25 at latest, and by 8 a.m. the night has passed 90 minutes ago and we are wide awake.

i would bet anything that none of this research has been conducted among people who live close to the equator, like Quito, Ecuador for example where the sun is always risen by 6 a.m.

I would bet anything that Ecuadorean teenagers are not sleepy at 8 a.m., nor are British teenagers sleepy at 10 a.m.

@de pedantic Dribbler June 29, 2019 11:41 AM “Consider that such a start would mean reveille at 5:30 latest for most…At least it would inculcate the cadet or scout camp discipline of early must-rise.”

Just three or four generations ago virtually everybody in Barbados worked in agriculture. Virtually everybody woke up at about 5 or 5:30 Those who practice agriculture in the tropics start early to get much of the work done before the day becomes too hot.

I don’t know if we have “evolved” so quickly that we need air conditioned SUV’s and ten o’clock starts.

Someone proposed changing the school hours at HC to the same times that presently occur at the St Michael School. It was reasoned that the change may alleviate traffic congestion but HC parents resisted the change even though their counterparts at the SMS noted the advantage of early end of school with after school activities.

Conservative is too mild a word to describe HC parents.

I will be astounded if the Government makes any of the wider, more radical proposed changes to the operation of schools e.g abolition of the common entrance and the establishment of middle schools

You are talking to a scientist and if you want to make serious proposals you’ll have to show us the costings, estimates of results, comparative analysis, etc. At least for one of your ideas.

But there can be no circumstances where these ideas could stand in for serious policies especially when the country and those so ‘trained’ have been in a state of failure for decades.

In any even, none of this, as implemented in the last number of years could have avoided the program, or a similar one, as being embarked upon. We estimate it would take 30 years to bring the required level of efficiency to food production, in a way to eliminate the food import bill, if the international system allows.

Maybe if your ideas, or similar ones, were implemented during the period after 1994 and had successfully restructured the economy circumstances might have been different.

We also noticed, that like both the current and former administrations, you seem to have no policy for dealing with the elephant/s in the room – the financialization of economy, the collapse of US dollar imperialism.

Maybe we need cheaper, simpler solutions, and not more complex more expensive ones? What if we had decent sidewalks, starting in central Bridgetown, and spreading all the way out to the countryside? What if all of the children who go to Harrison College, St. Michael’s, St. Ursula’s, St. Winifred’s, St. Mary’s, St. Patrick’s RC and other urban schools cold be dropped off a mile or so from their school and had proper sidewalks so that they could walk the rest of the way? What if part of a simpler solution was that all children would be given an umbrella or raincoat by their parents? What if no parent drove any further in than Holborn Circle, or the Bishop’s Court area?

Sign!!!

Sidewalk building?

They int much steal in day.

Why are we not worried that our children and grandchildren are fatter, and will likely become sicker earlier, and die earlier too?

What if our children and grandchildren DO NOT NEED to be driven in air conditioned SUV’s?

@ SirSimpleSimonPresidentForLife June 30, 2019 7:55 AM
Maybe we need cheaper, simpler solutions, and not more complex more expensive ones? What if we had decent sidewalks, starting in central Bridgetown, and spreading all the way out to the countryside? What if all of the children who go to Harrison College, St. Michael’s, St. Ursula’s, St. Winifred’s, St. Mary’s, St. Patrick’s RC and other urban schools cold be dropped off a mile or so from their school and had proper sidewalks so that they could walk the rest of the way? What if part of a simpler solution was that all children would be given an umbrella or raincoat by their parents? What if no parent drove any further in than Holborn Circle, or the Bishop’s Court area?”
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++=

I like your “Park and Walk to School solution.

How about an ‘easier and less costly’ solution?

Why not let the children who attend these ‘town’ schools be chosen mainly from the neighbouring communities?

Wouldn’t these schools be taking in annual cohorts of students who live within walking distance thereby eliminating the need to ‘bus’ them across parishes?

Wouldn’t that be the ultimate expression of proving that all the schools are indeed equal and are given equal resources?

Wouldn’t it be the diamond of altruism as an experiment in reverse social engineering by giving a leg up the socio-economic ladder to those are currently marginalized and condemned to the urban ghettoes as boys and the growing number of girls on the block?

http://www.walkingschoolbus.org/
Walking school bus
Why develop a walking school bus?
Studies show that fewer children are walking and biking to school, and more children are at risk of becoming overweight. Changing behaviors of children and parents require creative solutions that are safe and fun. Implementing a walking school bus can be both.

https://thewalkingschoolbus.com/
“THE WALKING SCHOOL BUS SUPPORTS ACCESS TO EDUCATION BY PROVIDING A HOLISTIC APPROACH TO EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENT. THEIR WORK INCLUDES PROVIDING SAFE TRANSPORTATION, NUTRITION, AND INNOVATIVE LITERACY PROGRAMS FOR STUDENTS IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES.”

@ Pacha
These are solutions not airy fairy . You are reaching a very interesting place now because you ask what policies I would recommend and now ask about costs. You note my radical approach is to both stem the outflow of foreign exchange and save foreign exchange. Perhaps your “scientific” mind ignores the simple fact that a penny saved is a penny earned.
Furthermore you have presented several opinions/ / policies/ ideas and not once have you attached the cost of any one of them.
All I am saying is that radical transformation is needed. You asked for my alternatives and I gave them. Go into the archives of BU and you read my pre election policies.

I took one of those walking school buses to school every day of my school life, starting at age 4. Now that I am way past age 64 i am still able to easily walk or work outdoors for up to 5 hours at a time, in 30 degree heat and near 100% humidity.

@ SirSimpleSimonPresidentForLife June 30, 2019 12:17 AM
“@Green Monkey “For teenagers, melatonin – the sleep hormone – doesn’t start being produced until 11pm.”
Our melatonin is regulated by the sun. The sun in Barbados does not rise as the same time as it does in Essex.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Eureka!! The Simple Simon has discovered the “god gene”!
So do you still believe in the ‘authenticity of the Adam & Eve story with melatonin being the fruit of diversity that put poor Adam to sleep?

But there is hope for you, El Presidente por Vida. One day you might just come to the ‘factually stark’ scientific realization that Adam was a white woman and Eve a black man (and a wicked (d)evil man too from “whitehill”).

A wonderful morning to the BU family. Hoping that your day is full of sunshine and laughter…
Obey my command “Go and have yourself a Greattt day.

====================XXX========================
”We need a “Just put it here section”. Sometimes I see an article that I just want to stick somewhere and make a minor comment and have no place to put it…. Odds and Ends

I think Dale is trying. But he is trying too damn hard and that is why he is getting it wrong.
I think he needs to push out one or two yes men and bring in someone who has the gumption to say
“Hold it. Not so fast. Before we announce a solution, let us study the problem and how to solve it. These problems are so deeply rooted and tangled that the “apparent quick fix” may not work.”

As is customary on BU I will give Dale some grades
B+ effort
C- Results
B- Realizing the problem is beyond him.

Mr Marshall
You can still get an A. Study and then fix the problem. Ease back on making predictions on when you can deliver; and if you say you will deliver tomorrow, then deliver before midnight tomorrow. Anything else, make you look like and amateur.

This is a prime minster who dislikes details, who does not think through policy, and who believes speech-making like a Pentecostal preacher (gesticulation and all) is all that is needed to sway Bajan opinion. And she is right. We are not critical thinkers. This is a bogus idea with the trimmings of nationalism. A government incapable of making serious decisions.
Since May 25, 2018, give me a government policy in which the prime minster has explained in detail?

I love this editorial. This fits nicely here with the HC start time and with Dale Marshall revising his delivery date.

The time of floating an idea out there and seeing how the wind blows must come to an end. The time of making promises and not delivering must come to an end.

I don’t care how much you want to be a part of Caricom or Mr Caribbean, we must have solutions that are suitable for Barbados. Each step must be Fully calculated. We must have a firm idea of what the results will be, before we conduct our experiment. Controlled experiments and not just doing and saying sh*t hoping for the best. It is too late for trial and error, especially when error seem to be the most frequent outcome

Here is a bit of advice for B’s and D’s.
If you did not know sht before you were elevated to the post, it is highly probable that you don’t know sht after you were elevate. Get advice from others (who know sh*t).

A shout out to the regulars of BU. You are doing a hell of a job and this is without lessons from Hal 🙂
I scan BU and the other sources of news.
Heer is my ranking
BU #1
BT #2. Improved vastly. There is still some cowardice as you can read a story and never see the names of the bad guys
De Others.. Trying to figure out what they are doing. Tempted to subscribe, but the price seem unreasonable.

See how easy it was to unmask the Dullard to reveal a rather bright spark!

You clearly have read between the lines to spot the vein of mocking sarcasm of the hot air emissions from the mouths of the political bull-shitters when it comes to the abolition of the 11-plus exam.

And replace it with what as a method to allocate students to those “great schools” remains the 166 sq. miles question facing the Bajan social-class division players.

I guess the bullshit-talking policy makers could come up with a quota system to reflect some form of Affirmative Action owing to the children of those ‘blackened’ boys (and girls) on the block who were incarcerated for dealing in marijuana now seen and the economic Joan of Arc for Barbados.

Good move by Harrison College because Barbados is really in dire need Daylight Saving(s) Time . At 5 am in the morning there is a surplus of daylight on the island which Barbadians do not use and this is due to the back that Barbados being the Easterly of the Caribbean Islands gets the rising sun first and much earlier than the other Caribbean islands.
At 7 pm it’s like being in a cave in Barbados . . . pitch dark , so moving the clocks forward 1 hour in Buhbados will give Bajans much more time to put the extra hour(s) to good use instead of having wasted daylight in the morning.
Now , I don’t know if this true beacuse I was not in Barbados during that time but I was told that the late Barbadian Prime Minister Tom Adams shot down the DST idea back in the 70’s / 80’s as a re-election ploy.

Why not consult the owners/operators of the railway operating out of St.Nicholas Abbey? They may have valid ideas and suggestions Perhaps a publicly/privately owned elevated solar and wind powered modern monorail system would result in a significant decrease in the need for ‘two and three-car families’,particularly, the many single-occupant vehicles which clog our highways and byways on a daily basis.Such a system would no doubt,also result in a reduction in the carnage caused by the many irresponsible ,reckless and unconscionable drivers ! Think about hospitalization and lost productivity ! Think about foreign exchange spent on repairs and replacement of damaged vehicles…etc. etc. Kudos to those who have dared to think and propose similarly !

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For the cause that lacks assistance, the wrong that needs resistance, for the future in the distance, and the good that [BU] can do -George Linnaeus Banks

BB – COVID 19 Tracker

Here are the 2 graphs for the week ending 5th June. In relation to active cases 4 of the 6 selected Caribbean countries are now trending to zero cases. The other 2, Jamaica and Guyana have a greater number of cases but are themselves rapidly trending downwards - Lyall Small